


Warmth

by notraelet



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Angst, Fluff, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, One-Sided Relationship, Pack Dynamics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-17
Updated: 2013-06-17
Packaged: 2017-12-15 06:38:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,256
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/846468
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/notraelet/pseuds/notraelet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <em>`And there’s a tightness around Derek’s heart that he won’t admit to even himself when he thinks about it- he’s alone, he’s always been alone.  In using the betas for power, he gave them a surrogate family in one another while maintaining his distance.  They found a sense of belonging in one another that they’d never had at home, and, for a time, they were probably even happy.  And now, there’s only one left, the lone survivor of two separate families, and there’s a pang in his chest that isn’t entirely unlike sympathy when he feels Isaac’s pleading gaze on his back.`</em>
</p><p>Isaac searches for companionship in the wake of Erica and Boyd's disappearance.  Derek can't give it to him, not entirely.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Warmth

Derek stares at the ceiling, his jaw tight as the lights from the city flicker across the walls through his open window. It’s difficult to sleep on the best of nights, fire flashes behind his eyes every time he closes them, and his ears pick up sounds that he feels are better left unheard.

Like the squeak of Isaac’s cot as he stands up in the other room, the soft patter of his socks against the hardwood floor as he paces, lost in his own thoughts.

And Derek knows that Isaac is just as sleepless as he is, and he knows why. The three betas had found solace in one another, found Pack, in a way that Derek had never anticipated. He’d _heard_ of wild packs bonding as they had, but was hard pressed to actually envision complete strangers becoming close to one another in the way that he and his family were before the fire.

At the time, he’d chalked it up to pure instinct. Still, he remembers walking past the three of them, curled up together on the pile of mothworn blankets on the train car, and he wonders if he’d been wrong.

There’s an instinct to be close to your packmates, he knows, but he remembers Isaac’s hand on Erica’s hip, her own fingers tangled in Boyd’s own, as his ankle hooked back around Isaac’s thigh- he remembers, and wonders if it was more than just instinct. The three of them, tangled together like that, and he remembers the early days when it was just him and Isaac, and Isaac would scream in his sleep.

Derek didn’t comfort him then.

Now, listening to his beta pace across the loft, he wonders if he should try to say something. But he doesn’t. Isaac had a family for a few short months, a _real_ family, and Derek tells himself that Isaac needs to learn the impermanence of his new life. Even if that means learning to sleep alone all over again, if that means going back to the nightmares, the cold, the isolation.

He can hear Isaac’s breathing.

Nobody really knows how much just breathing gives them away. A shaken gasp, a shallow sigh, deep breaths to overcome tears, quick and panicky inhales when your heart feels like exploding. Isaac’s own breathing is forced, timed impeccably, like he’s focusing on it- but not shuddery, not stilted. He breathes like he’s trying to keep himself calm, find peace with his thoughts.

Perhaps this is inevitable. Derek stares at the ceiling, glowing briefly in a car’s headlights, before fading into shadow again. He can hear the gentle padding of Isaac’s socks through the kitchen, toward the great window, and he pauses there.

 _Don’t,_ Derek thinks, _please don’t_. But, deaf to his thoughts, he can hear the footsteps halt before the staircase. Isaac’s breath is held, and Derek closes his eyes when he _feels_ Isaac resign himself to what he’s about to do and presses his foot down against the first step.

The climb is slow, and there are plenty of moments of silence that send a false hope through Derek’s chest- maybe Isaac has stopped, maybe he’s reconsidered, maybe he’s going to turn around and go back to bed.

But he reaches the top of the staircase instead, smelling like apprehension and loneliness and everything that Derek feels when he thinks of Laura’s body lying in a shallow grave. Isaac stops just outside his door and Derek closes his eyes, turning to face the wall away from the threshold as his beta tentatively steps through it.

Isaac knows he’s not asleep. His breathing is off, his shoulders are too tense. But Derek doesn’t say anything and Isaac doesn’t know what he’d say if he could, so there’s just silence between them.

They can’t keep dancing around the subject forever. What if they don’t find Erica and Boyd? What if the two of them are alone again? What if Isaac is next?

And there’s a tightness around Derek’s heart that he won’t admit to even himself when he thinks about it- he’s alone, he’s always been alone. In using the betas for power, he gave them a surrogate family in one another while maintaining his distance. They found a sense of belonging in one another that they’d never had at home, and, for a time, they were probably even happy. And now, there’s only one left, the lone survivor of two separate families, and there’s a pang in his chest that isn’t entirely unlike sympathy when he feels Isaac’s pleading gaze on his back.

He can’t give him anything. He can’t give anyone anything.

Still, the beta wolf steps forward, long legs in flannel pajama pants and thick socks to combat the cold wooden floor. He stops, just at the edge of Derek’s bed, and the silence that started out as heavy and meaningful is now just awkward. Derek is staring at the wall now, not even looking at him- and when Isaac reaches for the blankets, he closes his eyes with a sigh that’s more morose than exasperated.

“I don’t want- anything like that,” Isaac whispers, pulling the edge of Derek’s blankets aside. “I know my place.”

And Derek, he doesn’t move to stop him, doesn’t open his mouth to speak. Some might take that as a denial- Isaac knows him too well though, and takes it as a muted permission to continue, so he peels the blankets back and lifts up a leg, setting his knee on the mattress.

“You don’t have to do anything,” he speaks again, his voice soft, frail like he’s afraid that Derek is going to lash out at him, even as he climbs into Derek’s bed, his movements suggesting a softness that Derek knows isn’t entirely true- he’s seen Isaac fight, seen Isaac hurt people. He knows that these moments of vulnerability are few and far between, and as much as he doesn’t want Isaac to come to him like this, he knows that pushing him away would be worse.

“I just want- “

Isaac cuts himself off that time, mouth closed. He doesn’t know what he wants- or maybe he can’t quite put it into words, but Derek knows. Derek has slept alone since the first time he smelled smoke, and he knows what Isaac wants is as dangerous as the fire, as overwhelming as drowning in that ice.

Still. He pulls the blankets up around himself and doesn’t speak again. There’s no companionship in Derek’s bed, and any warmth he gives off isn’t meant for anyone but himself. But it’s warmth all the same, and maybe it’s better than sleeping alone, but Isaac’s shoulders are still tense.

“…we’re going to find them,” Derek finally says, his voice a low growl, eyes narrowed at the wall as if Deucalion’s face is peering back at him through it.

Whether it was the reassurance, or the fact that he just _spoke_ , Isaac’s shoulders relax a little, and Derek can feel the nod behind him.

He doesn’t move as his beta curls up beside him, pressing warmly against his back, forehead tucked into the curve between his shoulderblades. He doesn’t move as Isaac’s breathing evens out and his body goes slack. He doesn’t move when he feels the last bit of tension ease out of Isaac’s shoulders.

Derek can’t offer what Erica and Boyd could, and he can’t give Isaac what he wants. But there’s the warmth of his back and the steady sound of his heartbeat, and that will have to be enough.


End file.
